DOCSLIB.ORG

Susan Tiefenbrun, Child Soldiers

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Susan Tiefenbrun, Child Soldiers +(,121/,1( Citation: 31 Fordham Int'l L.J. 415 2007-2008 Provided by: Sponsored By: Thomas Jefferson School of Law Content downloaded/printed from HeinOnline Tue Dec 13 14:36:07 2016 -- Your use of this HeinOnline PDF indicates your acceptance of HeinOnline's Terms and Conditions of the license agreement available at http://heinonline.org/HOL/License -- The search text of this PDF is generated from uncorrected OCR text. -- To obtain permission to use this article beyond the scope of your HeinOnline license, please use: Copyright Information CHILD SOLDIERS, SLAVERY AND THE TRAFFICKING OF CHILDREN Susan Tiefenbrun* Introduction. ...................................... 417 A. Definitions ............................... 417 B. Extent of Child Soldiering Worldwide.......... 420 C. Abuses of Child Soldiers .................... 423 D. Organization of Article ............. ........ 426 I. The Root Causes of the Use of Child Soldiers...... 426 A. Voluntary and Forced Recruitment of Children 426 B. Why Children Become Soldiers .............. 427 C. Changes in Family and Ethical Values.......... 428 D. Globalization ............................. 428 E. AIDS and Orphans ........................ 429 F. Increase in the Use of Small Personal Weapons 429 G. Changes in the Nature of Warfare ............ 430 H. Military Reasons for the Use of Child Soldiers . 431 I. Social and Psychological Causes of the Use of Child Soldiers ............................ 431 J. Economic Reasons for the Use of Child Soldiers ................................. 432 K. Treatment of Child Soldiers as Criminals ...... 433 II. Laws Relating to the Use of Child Soldiers......... 434 A. Introduction ................................... 434 B. International Legal Instruments that Specifically Protect Children ................. 438 1. The Declaration of the Rights of the Child 438 2. United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child ("CRC") ................... 439 * Susan Tiefenbrun is a Professor of Law and the Director of the Center for Global Legal Studies at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego, California. She and Professor Jonathan Todres were the co-organizers of a Symposium on Challenges for Children's Rights that took place on March 2, 2007 at ThomasJefferson School of Law. Parts of this Article were delivered at that Symposium. Professor Tiefenbrun has done extensive research and writing in the field of human trafficking, sex trafficking of wo- men, and the economic implications of women and children trafficked for sex work. Professor Tiefenbrun wishes to thank Nichole Denton for her assistance with the re- search for this Article on child soldiers. She also wishes to thank June MacLeod, the librarian at the Thomas Jefferson School of Law, for her able assistance with the re- search of this paper. 415 416 FORDHAMINTERNATIONALLAWJOURNAL [Vol.31:415 3. Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict ("Children in Armed Conflict Protocol") ............... 442 4. Optional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Prostitution, and Pornography ("Sale of Children Protocol") .................... 445 C. International Humanitarian Laws and the Protection of Children ..................... 446 D. Domestic and International Human Trafficking L aw s............................................ 449 1. The United States Trafficking Victims Protection Act ("TVPA") ................. 449 2. Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to End the Exploitation of Children Today (PROTECT) Act of 2003 ("U.S. PROTECT Act") ................................. 453 3. The U.N. Convention Against Organized Transnational Crime and Supplementary Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children ("Palermo Protocol") ........ 455 4. Palermo Protocol and Provisions Specifically for Trafficking in Children ..... 457 E. International Laws Relating to Slavery.......... 457 1. Slavery Convention of 1926 .............. 458 2. U.N. Slavery Convention of 1956........... 458 3. Working Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery.............................. 459 F. International Labor Conventions and Child Solders .................................. 461 1. The Convention Concerning the Prohibition and Immediate Action for the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour ("ILO Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention 182") ................ 461 2. U.S. Department of Labor Recommendations on Child Labor (190) .. 462 III. Literary Representations of Child Soldiers ......... 463 A. Allah is Not Obliged by Ahmadou Kourouma.... 463 B. Beasts of No Nation by Uzodinma Iweala ........ 469 1. Rape ................................ 471 2008] TRAFlICKING OF CHILDREN 417 2. Denial of Education............. ....... 472 3. Helplessness and the Desire for Revenge of "Lost Children" ........................ 472 C. Soldiers But Not Real Soldiers: Prosecutorv. Thomas Lubanga Dyilo... ................... 473 D. Child Soldiers: Civilians or Combatants ........ 476 1. Starvation ................... ......... 476 2. Slavery ............................... 476 3. Use of Weaponry............. ......... 477 4. Exposure to and Forced Intake of Drugs... 478 5. Fostering of Self-Hate ................... 478 6. Autonomy............................. 478 7. Inability to Escape...................... 479 IV. Conclusion and Some Proposals for Solutions ...... 479 A. So M any Laws .................................. 479 B. Prevention ..................................... 480 C. Protection of Child Victims ................. 482 D. Economic Solutions .............. ......... 483 E. Prosecution of Perpetrators ................. 484 INTRODUCTION A. Definitions The prevalent use of children in armed combat is a contem- porary manifestation of slavery and a form of human trafficking that is as serious and as lucrative as the international crimes of trafficking in weapons and drugs.' Trafficking is defined as the illegal trade of contraband goods, usually across borders, in or- der to make a profit.2 Trafficking in persons, especially women and children, is the purchase and sale of human beings as cargo for the purpose of engaging in exploitative forms of labor such as sex work' or participation in armed conflict. Trafficking in children for their use on the battlefield is a human rights viola- 1. See generally Susan Tiefenbrun, Sex Sells But Drugs Don't Talk: Trafficking of Women Sex Workers and an Economic Solution, 24 T. JEFFERSON L. REV. 161 (2002). 2. See Sandrine Valentine, Trafficking of Child Soldiers: Expanding the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and Its OptionalProtocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, 9 NEw ENG.J. INT'L & Comp L. 109, 109 (2003); see also U.N. CHILDREN'S FUND ("UNICEF"), CHILD PROTECrION INFORMATION SHEETS 27 (2006), available at http://www.unicef.org/publications/files/ChildProtectionInformationSheets.pdf. 3. See Tiefenbrun, supra note 1, at 167; see also Valentine, supra note 2, at 109. 418 FORDHAM INTERNATIONAL LAWJOURNAL [Vol. 31:415 tion that rises to the level of slavery.' The United Nations Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Pun- ish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, Sup- plementing the United Nations Convention Against Transna- tional Organized Crime ("Palermo Protocol")5 defines traffick- ing as: the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or re- ceipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, or the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation.' The recruitment of a child (i.e. a person under the age of eigh- teen) for the purpose of sexual exploitation or participation in armed conflict falls under the ambit of "trafficking in persons."' The international definition of the trafficking of child soldiers involves three necessary elements: consent, exploita- 4. See Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000, 22 U.S.C. § 7105 (2006) [hereinafter TVPA], for the link between trafficking of persons and slavery. The Rome Statute that founded the International Criminal Court ("ICC") also recognizes trafficking in persons as "enslavement" (Article 7) which is considered a "crime against humanity." Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, United Nations Diplo- matic Conference of Plenipotentiaries on the Establishment of an International Crimi- nal Court, Rome, Italy, June 15-16, 1998, U.N.Doc. A/CONF.183/9 (1998), art. 7 (en- tered into force July 1, 2002) [hereinafter Rome Statute]. On the issue of trafficking of persons as a contemporary form of slavery, see generally Susan Tiefenbrun, The Cul- tural, Political, and Legal Climate Behind the Fight to Stop Trafficking in Women: William j Clinton's Legacy to Women's Rights, 12 CARDOZOJ. L. & GENDER 855 (2006); Susan Tiefen- brun, The Domestic and InternationalImpact of the U.S. Victims of Trafficking ProtectionAct of 2000: Does Law Deter Crime? 2 Loy. U. CHI. INT'L L. REv. 193 (2005), reprinted and com- pletely updated in 38 CASE W. REs. J. INT'L L. 249 (2007); Susan Tiefenbrun, Sex Slavery in the United States and Its Law to Stop It Here and Abroad, 11 Wm. & MARYJ. WOMEN & L. 317 (2005); Susan Tiefenbrun, Copyright Infringement, Sex Trafficking and Defamation in the FictionalLife of a Geisha, 10 MICH. J. GENDER & L. 327 (2004); Susan Tiefenbrun, The Saga of Susannah: A U.S. Remedy for Sex Trafficking
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Beah, Ishmael 2007. the Making, and Unmaking, of a Child Soldier. New
    Ishmael Beah - "A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier" - New York Times Page 1 of 16 January 14, 2007 The Making, and Unmaking, of a Child Soldier By ISHMAEL BEAH Sometimes I feel that living in New York City, having a good family and friends, and just being alive is a dream, that perhaps this second life of mine isn’t really happening. Whenever I speak at the United Nations, Unicef or elsewhere to raise awareness of the continual and rampant recruitment of children in wars around the world, I come to realize that I still do not fully understand how I could have possibly survived the civil war in my country, Sierra Leone. Most of my friends, after meeting the woman whom I think of as my new mother, a Brooklyn- born white Jewish-American, assume that I was either adopted at a very young age or that my mother married an African man. They would never imagine that I was 17 when I came to live with her and that I had been a child soldier and participated in one of the most brutal wars in recent history. In early 1993, when I was 12, I was separated from my family as the Sierra Leone civil war, which began two years earlier, came into my life. The rebel army, known as the Revolutionary United Front (R.U.F.), attacked my town in the southern part of the country. I ran away, along paths and roads that were littered with dead bodies, some mutilated in ways so horrible that looking at them left a permanent scar on my memory.
    [Show full text]
  • The Phenomenon of Child Soldiers As Seen Through Ishmael Beah’S a Long Way Gone
    INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE, LITERATURE AND TRANSLATION STUDIES (IJELR) A QUARTERLY, INDEXED, REFEREED AND PEER REVIEWED OPEN ACCESS INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL http://www.ijelr.in (Impact Factor: 5.9745) (ICI) KY PUBLICATIONS RESEARCH ARTICLE ARTICLE Vol. 7. Issue.4. 2020 (Oct-Dec) THE PHENOMENON OF CHILD SOLDIERS AS SEEN THROUGH ISHMAEL BEAH’S A LONG WAY GONE SIDI CHABI Moussa Senior Lecturer of African Literature at the Department of Anglophone Studies Faculty of Letters, Arts and Human Sciences University of Parakou (UP), Parakou, Republic of BÉNIN Email: [email protected] ABSTRACT The present research work aims at examining critically the phenomenon of child soldiers as seen through Ishmael Beah’s A Long Way Gone. The issue of child soldiers is a worldwide phenomenon. However, it is more noticeable in developing nations where the lack of adequate social infrastructure and socio-economic programmes threatens the developmental needs of these children. Institutional assistance from governments, international institutions and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) in providing some resources for the child soldiers is either inadequate or Article information Received:28/10/2020 non-existent. Hence the necessity to carry out this study to make visible and glaring Accepted: 22/12/2020 a situation that many people have consciously tried to ignore. The methodological Published online:27/12/2020 approaches used in this paper are the phenomenological and descriptive doi: 10.33329/ijelr.7.4.205 approaches. The literary theories applied to the study are psychological and psychoanalytic criticism. Psychological criticism deals with a literary work primarily as an expression, in fictional form, of the personality, state of mind, feelings, and desires of its author.
    [Show full text]
  • Child Soldiers and Blood Diamonds OVERVIEW & OBJECTIVES GRADES
    Civil War in Sierra Leone: Child Soldiers and Blood Diamonds OVERVIEW & OBJECTIVES GRADES This lesson addresses the civil war in Sierra Leone to 8 illustrate the problem of child soldiers and the use of diamonds to finance the war. Students will draw TIME conclusions about the impact of the ten years civil war on the people of Sierra Leone, as well as on a boy who 4-5 class periods lived through it, by reading an excerpt from his book, A Long Way Gone. This lesson explores the concepts REQUIRED MATERIALS of civil war, conflict diamonds, and child soldiers in Sierra Leone while investigating countries of West Computer with projector Africa. Students will also examine the Rights of the Child and identify universal rights and Computer Internet access for students responsibilities. Pictures of child soldiers Poster paper and markers Students will be able to... Articles: Chapter One from A Long Way describe the effects of Sierra Leone’s civil war. Gone by Ishmael Beah; “What are Conflict analyze the connection between conflict Diamonds”; “How the Diamond Trade diamonds and child soldiers. Works”; “Rights for Every Child” analyze the role diamonds play in Africa’s civil wars Handouts: “Pre-Test on Sierra Leone”; compare their life in the United States with the “Post-Test on Sierra Leone”; “Sierra Leone lives of people in Sierra Leone. and Its Neighbors” describe the location and physical and human geography of Sierra Leone and West Africa. identify factors that affect Sierra Leone’s economic development analyze statistics to compare Sierra Leone and its neighbors. assess the Rights of the Child for Sierra Leone analyze the Rights of the Child and the responsibility to maintain the rights MINNESOTA SOCIAL STUDIES STANDARDS & BENCHMARKS Standard 1.
    [Show full text]
  • Ishmael Beah
    Ishmael Beah Ishmael Beah was born in Sierra Leone. He is the "New York Times" bestselling author of "A Long Way Gone, Memoirs of a Boy Soldier". His work has appeared in the "New York Times Magazine", "Vespertine Press", "LIT" and "Parabola" magazines. He is a UNICEF advocate for Children Affected by War and a member of the Human Rights Watch Children’s Advisory Committee. He is a graduate of Oberlin College, Ohio with a B.A in Political Science. FLYING WITH ONE WING By Ishmael Beah It was the first time she had seen her father weep. His body trembled as he walked onto a piece of land that was now consumed by grass. A tall cement pillar still stood on the far end of the land, bearing residues of smoke, rain, dust, and scars from sharp metals that had left visible holes of dark moments. He looked back at his daughter and managed to conjure a smile. He kicked in the grass to reveal some part of the remaining foundation. “This is where I use to sit, this was my classroom.” He placed his fingers on the ground. “This was my school. I can still hear our voices reciting the alphabet, greeting our teacher, ‘good morning Mr. Kanagbole.’ and running outside during break, screaming our desired positions for the football match that we played everyday.” He continued and sat on the ground. His daughter sat next to him. She was accompanying her father back to his home where he had always said the core of his heart still lived.
    [Show full text]
  • Transformational War Literature for Young People
    Chloë Hughes Swords into Words: Transformational War Literature for Young People Young People and War orn in the early 1960s in the United Kingdom, I entered the world at a relatively stable and peaceful time in British history. My parents, however, grew up in the thick of World War II and their stories of the Blitz, interruptedB schooling, rationing, compulsory evacuations, and loved ones lost in combat are with me still. On September 3rd 1939, my father, aged eight, was playing outside in the late summer sunshine, sporting a cowboy holster and spud-gun on a leather belt. The next door neighbors invited his family to hear an important announcement by Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain on their prized radio. It was the British Declaration of War. Just over a year later, an air-raid siren sounded and, as my father hurried to a communal shelter, the bright sunlight was soon obscured by planes emblazoned with swastikas. My father’s family lived near Portsmouth, home to a large naval base and a regular target for bombing raids by the Luftwaffe. Over 10,000 incendiary bombs fell in a single night destroying nearby houses and my father’s elementary school. As if the enemy attacks were not enough, terrifying noises from anti-aircraft “ack-ack” guns tore the sky apart, and search lights from barrage balloons crisscrossed the dismal night. Every member of my father’s family was involved in World War II. My father’s father, born in 1881, had served throughout the Great War in Flanders and spent 22 years in the artillery before working as a gate policeman at an ordnance depot.
    [Show full text]
  • Particular Social Group, Child Soldiers, and the Failure of U.S
    Florida State University Law Review Volume 38 Issue 3 Article 5 2011 Lost in Doctrine: Particular Social Group, Child Soldiers, and the Failure of U.S. Asylum Law to Protect Exploited Children Tessa Davis [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.law.fsu.edu/lr Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Tessa Davis, Lost in Doctrine: Particular Social Group, Child Soldiers, and the Failure of U.S. Asylum Law to Protect Exploited Children, 38 Fla. St. U. L. Rev. (2011) . https://ir.law.fsu.edu/lr/vol38/iss3/5 This Note is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Florida State University Law Review by an authorized editor of Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW LOST IN DOCTRINE: PARTICULAR SOCIAL GROUP, CHILD SOLDIERS, AND THE FAILURE OF U.S. ASYLUM LAW TO PROTECT EXPLOITED CHILDREN Tessa Davis VOLUME 38 SPRING 2011 NUMBER 3 Recommended citation: Tessa Davis, Lost in Doctrine: Particular Social Group, Child Soldiers, and the Failure of U.S. Asylum Law to Protect Exploited Children, 38 FLA. ST. U. L. REV. 653 (2011). LOST IN DOCTRINE: PARTICULAR SOCIAL GROUP, CHILD SOLDIERS, AND THE FAILURE OF U.S. ASYLUM LAW TO PROTECT EXPLOITED CHILDREN TESSA DAVIS∗ ABSTRACT Exploited and persecuted, child soldiers live lives dominated by violence, fear, and death. Very few will find security within their own nations or abroad. Subjected to exclusionary bars or rigid interpretations of the particular social group ground for asylum, U.S.
    [Show full text]
  • A Long Way Gone Summer Packet
    Student Name: _____________________________________________________________ Score _____/100 A Long Way Gone Summer Packet “These days I live in three worlds: my dreams, and the experiences of my new life, which trigger memories from the past.” -Ishmael Beah, p. 20 12th Grade - A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah Google Drive files (these are not in order, please select by chapter): CLICK You must use your @esd-15.org account to access the drive. Introduction From: Reading Group Gold An estimated 300,000 child soldiers now fight in the more than fifty violent conflicts raging around the globe. Far removed from the world of pundits and journalists, policymakers and diplomats, a thirteen-year-old boy named Ishmael Beah became one of these young warriors in Sierra Leone. Now in his mid-twenties, he courageously tells of the horrific road that led him to wield an AK-47 and, fueled by trauma and drugs, commit terrible acts. A Long Way Gone brings a rare voice of frontline realism to a widely publicized (and widely misunderstood) human-rights crisis. In poignantly clear and dauntless storytelling, Ishmael describes how he fled brutal rebel soldiers, traveling miles from home on foot and gradually being reduced to a life of raw survival instincts. Yet, unlike so many of his peers, Ishmael lived to reclaim his true self, emerging from Sierra Leone as the gentle, hopeful young man he was at heart. His memoir is at once crucial testimony for understanding the tragedy of contemporary war zones, and a testament to the power of peacemakers. A Long Way Gone is a plea for understanding of a political and social climate which allows innocent children to become killers.
    [Show full text]
  • A Long Way Gone Reading Guide
    Author Information ‐ Ishmael Beah A Long Way Gone Reading Guide Ishmael Beah was born in Sierra Leone in 1980. He moved to the United States in 1998 and finished his last two years of high school at the United Nations International School in New York. In 2004 he graduated from Oberlin College with a B.A. in political science. He is a member of the Human Rights Watch Children’s Rights Division Advisory Committee and has spoken before the United Nations, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Center for Emerging Threats and Opportu‐ nities (CETO). His work has appeared in VespertinePress and LIT magazine. He lives in New York City. – Macmillan Academic Synergy: A Long Way Gone ‐ Awards and Distinctions UNCW’s Common Reading Experience National Book Critic Circle Award Fall 2009 Selection Winner of the Alex Award A Quill Book Award Finalist A Long Way Gone is a powerful personal account of war and A New York Times Notable Book of the Year violence, redemption and hope. It was selected for its A Time Magazine Best Book of the Year potential to spark passionate discussions and to increase A Newsweek Favorite Book of the Year awareness of global issues. Read along with UNCW TIME 100 Best Novels (1923­Present) students, faculty, and staff and participate in events and discussions throughout the Fall 2009 semester. The UNCW Common Reading Experience supports the university mission of integration of teaching, research, and “Everyone in the world should read this book . We should read it to service and the stimulation of intellectual curiosity, imagination, learn about the world and about what it means to be human.” critical thinking, and thoughtful expression.
    [Show full text]
  • “Reading for the 'Real' Africa”: African Literature, American Readers, Oprah
    “Reading for the ‘Real’ Africa”: African literature, American readers, Oprah, and exotification by Angeline Royall-Kahin A thesis presented for the B. A. degree with Honors in The Department of English University of Michigan Spring 2010 © 22 March 2010, Angeline Royall-Kahin Acknowledgements I would like to thank my adviser, Professor Jennifer Wenzel for her extraordinary guidance, insistence, and necessary work at the intersection of English literature, human rights, and Africa; Professor Cathy Sanok for her much needed encouragement, advice, and mind maintenance; Professor Joey Slaughter for introducing me to African literature beyond Things Fall Apart and inspiring me to write a thesis; Professor Megan Sweeney for teaching to me to be humble and appreciate the reader; Professor Howard Stein for teaching me to be critical of international aid, especially the World Bank. To my parents, who showed me that you can do anything with an undergraduate English degree (and even rise up from that dreaded cardboard box). Especially, I would thank my mom for introducing me to her work within Africa and changing my life for the better because of it. To my friends for their emotional and academic support from the third floor of the undergraduate library to the third floor of the north stacks. And an amazing thesis cohort that made me laugh when on the verge of tears and could always be depended on to be at the library until close. Abstract Though the African Writers Series increased the Western readership of 20th c. Anglo- African literature, it is possible that the novels in the AWS encouraged foreign audiences to look at the literature with an “anthropological gaze.” Contemporary African literature today still has a comparatively small presence in the West, inevitably limiting the views in which Western readers imagine Africa and the life of Africans.
    [Show full text]
  • Ishmael Beah, Author of a Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Child
    FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Bonnie Franklin: [email protected] August 1, 2008 AUTHOR AND FORMER CHILD SOLDIER ISHMAEL BEAH TO SPEAK AT RAMAPO COLLEGE OPENING CONVOCATION (Mahwah) – Ishmael Beah, author of A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Child Soldier, will be the guest speaker at Ramapo College’s Opening Convocation Wednesday, September 19 at 1 p.m. Beah has shared his memoirs and continued his advocacy work on behalf of children affected by war at numerous speaking engagements and through interviews for a variety of media outlets including PBS, ABC, “The Daily Show” and YouTube. The Convocation will be held in the Arena of the Bill Bradley Sports and Recreation Center, located on campus. The public is invited to attend; admission is free. For information, please call 201.684.7910. Ishmael Beah was born in Sierra Leone in 1980. When he was 11, Beah’s life, along with the lives of millions of other Sierra Leoneans, was derailed by the outbreak of a brutal civil war. After his parents and two brothers were killed, Beah was recruited to fight as a child soldier. He was 13. He fought for over two years before he was removed from the army by UNICEF and placed in a rehabilitation home in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone. After completing rehabilitation in late 1996, Beah won a competition to attend a conference at the United Nations to talk about the devastating effects of war on children in his country. It was there that he met his new mother, Laura Simms, a professional storyteller who lives in New York.
    [Show full text]
  • Discussion Questions for a Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier 1
    Discussion Questions for A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier 1. A Long Way Gone has been heralded as “one of the most important war stories of our generation.” The book is a memoir about the children who are trapped in a cycle of brutality and abuse during the Sierra Leone civil war. At its core, however, it is also a story about community, family, and survival. Would you consider A Long Way Gone a war story? Why or why not? Why should this be an important story for our generation? What lessons should we learn from this story? 2. Ishmael Beah opens his memoir with a dialogue between his American high school friends and himself in New York. What is their perspective on war? How does it compare to the perspective that Beah provides in the book? Are there similarities in how they view war? 3. Although most of the book’s events occur in Sierra Leone, American culture is a pervasive theme in the memoir and in the author’s life. What positive influences does American culture have on Beah? Negatives? a. What role does rap and hip hop play in Beah’s life? On more than one occasion hip hop saves Beah’s life. How? Consider pages 38, 67, and 169. b. Throughout the book, the children imagine themselves as Rambo. Rambo is a movie about a Vietnam War veteran who returns to America after the war and is unable to separate his Vietnam War experience from reality. What role do American movies play in child soldiering? c.
    [Show full text]
  • Ishmael Beah
    For more information contact us on: North America 855.414.1034 International +1 646.307.5567 [email protected] Ishmael Beah Topics Activism and Social Justice, Common Reads/FYE, Global Affairs, Inspirational Speakers Travels From New York Bio Ishmael Beah is a human rights activist and author of the powerful memoir A Long Way Gone, which recounts his childhood journey through war-torn Sierra Leone. The book was a number one New York Times bestseller and has been published in over forty languages. In 1991, the outbreak of a brutal civil war in Sierra Leone upended the lives of millions. Ishmael’s parents and two brothers were killed and he was forcibly recruited into the war at age 13. After two years, with UNICEF help, he was removed from the army and placed in a rehabilitation home in Freetown. At the 1996 United Nations presentation of the Machel Report on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Children, Ishmael spoke about the devastating effects of war on children in his country. In May 2000, at the UN Special Session on Children, he served on a panel entitled ‘Reclaiming Our Children: The UN Responds to the Plight of the Child Soldier.’ The panel included then Secretary General Kofi Annan and UN agency heads. Ishmael Beah continues his advocacy to help change the course for the thousands of children still trapped in wars. He is a member of the Human Rights Watch Children’s Rights Division Advisory Committee and has testified before the page 1 / 4 For more information contact us on: North America 855.414.1034 International +1 646.307.5567 [email protected] United States Congress.
    [Show full text]